Actually Gustav, I do not like Motortrend at all, but CarandDriver does a much better job of detailed testing and seems to be the most consistent of the bunch. Road&Track also seems to do a OK job, but CarandDriver is the best. I just cancelled my subscription to Motortrend. Also AutoWeek is pretty good. So don't judge all our magazines by suckass Motortrend.
I share your thoughts there Jeff. When I stay in US I always buy Car and Driver.
But I feel Road and Track test more exotic cars. In fact they tested the Alpina B10 BiTurbo once. Correct? Well, those high speed runs features of Car and Driver is fun too!
And maybe MotorTrend is not good at all. But anyway, they test some nice AMG Mercedes models in the current issue.
1. Autoweek- Ive read reviews where they say "dont buy this car"- that takes guts when you depend on ads to pay the bills. this mag is truthful but since its weekly you can read it in 20 minutes.
2. Automobile- I thought the review of the 360 vs Z8 was too short- it left me wanting more, maybe its because the cars are so fantastic, or the author spent too much time discussing tech things I can find on the net and not enough real driving impressions. Anyhow, its #2, overall a good mag.
3. Car & Driver / Road & Track- Solid reporting, reviews are mostly trustworthy but they give a nod to the people footing the bills. You can trust their numbers though (0-60mph, etc)
4 (by a large margin distant from 1-3) Motortrend Their numbers are always the most "aggressive" so if you see 0-60 4.0 seconds you can probably figure that its more like 5 seconds. Their Car of the Year awards are for sale. The only thing this mag is good for is pictures.
Autoweek used to be the source of motorsport information, many years ago. Sometime in the '80s they took a turn toward road cars.
Automobile is often the best 'reading' of the US magazines.
Road and Track and Car & Driver are owned by the same firm, C/D is the more entertaining of the two but R&T has a very good technical editor. I last read R&T seriously when they had Rob Walker doing their F1 reporting. As for reviews, the less said the better - they really go out of their way not to say anything bad, reading their groveling crap is a little tedious.
I think the last issue of Motor Trend I own is dated 1978.
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